“Can you do that?” Ting-a-ling whispered.
Rev just snorted. He could feel his warrior start to stir—only right now, he was using the term “warrior” to himself when it was really his old bugaboo, his temper starting to rise. He got the next plate, and with Ting-a-ling’s help, matched the MDS soldier’s lift.
Around him, people slowly became aware of what was going on. Exercise petered out as other troopers edged a little closer to watch. The vice-director’s advice not to reveal too much tried to force its way into Rev’s thinking with tiny butterfly wings. His warrior, who had been quiescent for months, seemed to realize something was up, and he roared to life, smashing the butterfly away.
Rev gave Kvat a steady look, then dropped back. He reached up as casually as he could, then raised the barbell from the stops. He gave a dramatic sigh, then smoothly pumped out nine reps to match the karnan.
“Good job, Rev,” Ting-a-ling said.
Rev sat up and gave Kvat two raised eyebrows.
The trooper smiled and, with Wymont, put two more plates on the bar. He quickly got on his back and did a set of five. It was three fewer and might not have been as smooth as the first time, but the lifts were all good, and several of the observers clapped their hands when he got the last one up.
Rev smiled, but he was a little concerned. He’d managed that much before, but that was before he’d lost his arm. With Pashu, he wouldn’t be worried, but his social arm wasn’t designed for heavy lifting. He wasn’t sure it would hold up.
Well, no way to know unless I try. Besides, the asshole was struggling with that one. This might be the last increase.
He nodded to Ting-a-ling, who put on two more plates. He really wished that he’d tried this much weight before this, but by accepting the first challenge, he was backed into a corner. With what he hoped projected nonchalance, he gave Kvat a single glance, then lay down. This time, he took a little more care placing his hands, making sure that his social forearm would be at the exact vertical to the deck as he lifted.
Please, just let me get this up.
He calmed his mind, picturing the weights going up. With a grunt that was real this time, Rev pushed. The weight hurt his right hand, but he got it up, and before he could revel in that, he pumped out five more, making the total six. The last lift sent a stab of pain through his shoulder, but he just smiled at the karnan while people applauded the effort.
Kvat nodded, then pointed four fingers at the weight rack. He kept his eyes locked on Rev with that same grin on his face while Wymont put four more plates on. Rev just smiled back at him.
Show off. You struggled with 470.
The weight room quieted as Kvat got ready. No one was exercising on their own now with all eyes on the challenge. The karnan lowered himself to his back, took the bar, and slowly took five huge breaths. With a grunt, he arched his back and pressed the bar up. He wavered, and one arm locked well before the first, but he made a successful lift as the room erupted in cheers.
He slammed it back down on the posts that shuddered under the impact.
Rev looked at the massive weights. At 550 kilos, that was close to the galaxy record for an unaugmented person. But that person would have been a competitive weightlifter, and that’s what he trained for day and night.
Rev was just a normal guy, but with augments that made him stronger. Augmented people were not allowed to compete in professional sports, but he was sure some augmented lifter had blown past that record. Not Rev, though. And at the moment, his limiting factor was his prosthesis. He didn’t know what it was rated for.
“Do you have the load-bearing limit on my social arm?”
Whatever the rated load, he couldn’t back down, though. Pride and anger drove him forward.
Hell, they always give a cushion. And I’ve got the bulked-up sleeve, so that should help.
He nodded to Ting-a-ling. He hadn’t noticed Akkeke in the gym, but the corporal pushed forward through the rest of the crowd to help the Frisian. It was just a little thing, but Rev appreciated the squad show of support. He got into position, and Ting-a-ling and Akkeke stood behind his head to spot him. Kvat didn’t have a spotter, probably trying to show he didn’t need one, but Rev was fine with having the two of them.
You can do this, Reverent. You’re a Union Marine.
An image flashed through his mind of Tomiko assuring him that he could do whatever he took upon himself. Sometimes, though, she had more confidence in him than he did himself.
Rev shook his head. He didn’t know why that image popped up, but he didn’t need the distraction.
He took three deep and measured breaths, and with a shout, put every gram of force he could into the lift. He got it off the bar and above his chest.
It’s freaking heavy!
Of course, he knew it would be heavy. But the weight seemed to drive through his arm, trying to become one with the moon’s surface.
Just do it.
Rev lowered the weight to his chest, and without pausing, drove it up.
Or, at least, he tried to.
He managed to get it up about fifteen centimeters when his social arm faltered. He tried to struggle with his organic arm, and it inched a bit higher.
Ting-a-ling started to reach in to help when Rev yelled, “No! I’ve got it!”
The Frisian looked surprised, and he started to back off when Rev gave one last push . . . and someone drove a knife into his shoulder. His prosthesis collapsed, and his right arm gave out. The barbell bounced off Rev’s chest before his two spotters could grab it.
Rev saw stars as he struggled for breath. He was barely aware of the shouting, of hands grabbing him. His universe had shuddered to a stop. Nothing else mattered. But as quick as that had been, the universe started spinning up again. Rev sat up, gasping for breath.
“You OK?” someone asked as he prodded at Rev’s ribs.
Rev tried to knock the hands away, but his social arm didn’t respond. He reached with his right and grabbed the trooper’s wrist.
“I’m a medic. Let me look at you.”
Rev released the wrist and sat there in utter embarrassment as a hundred sets of eyes were locked onto him. He refused to look to his right. That was one set of eyes he really didn’t want to see right now.
“What the hell do you have under here?” the medic asked. “It feels like chain mail.”
“He’s a Union IBHU Marine,” Ting-a-ling told him. “That’s normal for him.”
The medic huffed, then said, “Well, lucky for him. By the Mother, that was five hundred kilos landing on him. I don’t feel anything broken, but let’s get him checked out.”
“Five-fifty. Not five hundred,” Rev muttered.
“Whatever. It was a lot.” He waved his fingers in front of Rev’s eyes and did a few other medic-type things that Rev barely noticed. He was too conscious of being the center of attention.
“Can you stand?”
“Yeah.”
With the medic assisting him, Rev rose to his feet. His head swam a bit, and his chest hurt, but the worst thing was his shoulder was afire and the fact that his prosthesis wasn’t working.
“OK, I’m going to take you back to sickbay. We’re going to get you checked out.”
“Do you want me to go with you?” Ting-a-ling asked.
“No. I’ll be fine. But you better tell Gamay. I’ll give her an update after I get checked.
Rev and the medic started making their way through the crowd. A few troopers reached out to pat him on the back or said something along the lines of “Good try.”
But Rev wasn’t having it. This was on him. He’d let his pride, competitiveness, and anger get the better of him. He’d let a karnan pull his strings like any good puppet master.
Hell, I asked Punch for my arm’s capabilities. Why didn’t I pay attention to that?
The two reached the door out of the weight room when Kvat called out, �
��Hey, Pelletier!”
Rev stopped. He debated ignoring the karnan, but he knew all those eyes were still on him, and how he reacted would not only affect him but on all Union Marines.
He forced a smile. He had to show he was a good sport even if he wanted to just slink away.
He turned, ready to offer the karnan his congratulations, but Kvat was on his back, hands on the barbell. As soon as he saw that Rev was watching, he lifted the 550 kilos off the posts and quickly did three reps, showing no sign of strain. He returned the weights, sat up, and high-fived Wymont as the two laughed.
There were exclamations and hooting from the crowd. Rev watched their celebration for a moment, then without another word, turned and left the weight room.
* * *
“Damn, Rev. What the hell did you do to this?” Daryll asked.
Rev had caught the tech just as he was closing his shop for the day, but when he saw Rev’s prosthesis hanging limply, he unlocked the door and ushered Rev inside. It took him more than a minute to work the arm loose and inspect the damage.
“Nothing.”
“Well, obviously something. The inner sleeve ring’s ripped free and warped. All the connectors have been yanked out. You didn’t do this spanking the monkey, Rev.”
Rev didn’t reply.
“Come on, Rev. I need to know so I can figure out how to go about fixing it.”
Rev was mortified and angry at himself. He couldn’t believe that he had let a karnan manipulate and play him the fool like that. He’d worked some good will with the training accident, and now he’d blown that.
And that little trick at the end, where Kvat had acted like he was at the limit of his abilities, was just the final straw. Laughter had chased him from the weight room as he left with the medic.
All the little incident had proven was that Rev was no different from the hotheaded kid he was prior to his conscription, that he had no control over his competitive emotions, and the karnans were much stronger than augmented Marines, even IBHU Marines. The only good thing was that he was given a clean bill of health at sickbay. The damage was to his prosthesis . . . and ego.
But he had to tell Daryll something, and the tech would find out soon enough as the story made its rounds.
“Lifting weights.”
“Really? How much weight?”
“Five-fifty.”
“As in kilos? Kilos that most of humanity uses, not 550 pounds like on Barclay?”
Rev nodded.
“Fuck, Rev. Why would you do something like that? Your prosthesis isn’t rated for anything close to that.”
Rev just shrugged while Daryll hooked the arm up to one of his machines. The Seiben head tech scowled as he watched the numbers appear on the display.
“You’re lucky. The arm’s OK. It’s just the connectors and the lip. I’ll have to replace those, but depending on your shoulder, that could be an easy fix.
“You dodged a big one. It could have been the arm itself that gave out. Now, let me look at your shoulder.”
Still scowling, he shined a penlight into Rev’s sleeve. He used it as a probe to poke around inside. “Looks like the HD-ring is shot, but the rest seems to be OK.”
“Can you fix that?”
“Can you fix that?” he mimicked in a high voice. “You should have thought of that before you went off and tried to be a stud. Yes, I can fix that. Your shoulder itself is rated for far more weight. The HD-ring is damaged because of your social arm tearing free. I’ll put in a new one, and it will be fine.”
“How long for that? I need to see my squad leader.”
“It ain’t gonna be tonight. I’ve got to get the program for the HD-ring and print it up. Tomorrow morning.”
“And my arm?” Rev asked, nodding at his prosthesis.
“That? I won’t know for sure until I get into the nitty-gritty. But tomorrow at the soonest. You’re just gonna have to do without an arm for the night.”
For a moment, Rev wanted to argue, to tell him that he’d wait right there until they were done, but the fight had gone out of him. He just nodded, got up, and told the tech he’d be back in the morning. The squad had training scheduled, but this took precedence, just as if he’d been hurt and was in sickbay.
Rev felt naked as he returned to the company area. He’d been without his arm in public before, but now, it was like waving a flag announcing that the karnan had defeated him. There was no putting off the inevitable, though. Because he was not combat-effective at the moment, he had to report in to his command.
When he entered the company office, Corporal White glanced up and quickly looked back down at his screen. Rev knew right then that the word had already reached the company headquarters.
All of the squad leaders shared a small office at the back of the main space. With a barely suppressed sigh, he headed to it and rapped on the sill. “Staff Sergeant Pelletier to see Sergeant First Class Gamay.”
“Get in here, Pelletier.”
Four more squad leaders were there, and they left to give them a moment of privacy.
“So, it’s true,” Gamay said when she saw his missing arm. “Figured as much, but I was hoping. Sit.”
The squad leaders’ space was a set of cupboards along the wall and a beat-up table in the middle with seven chairs. Rev took one of the chairs and sat across from his squad leader.
“So, what’s the damage. You combat-ready?”
“No. There’s some minor damage to the HD-ring, and Mr. Begay is printing up a new one. I should be good to go sometime tomorrow.”
Gamay grunted. “Not so bad, then. Worst thing damaged is your ego, I’m guessing.”
Despite himself, Rev gave a half-grin and said, “That took a pretty big hit there.”
“And now everyone knows about it.”
“If not now, then soon, I imagine,” Rev said, his smile gone.
“So, get over it.”
“Excuse me?” Rev wasn’t sure how he could just “get over it.”
“You think you’re the only one who’s been played here? Happens a lot. In case you’ve forgotten, we’ve got a lot of folks from all over humanity, and we haven’t always been on good terms with each other. You and me—Union and Rigel—we had a war only thirty years ago, right? So, if it wasn’t Kvat, maybe I’d have done you dirty sometime. Just not so you were out of commission. But this time, the Mad Dog played you, and he won.
“All I care about is if you’re combat-ready. If we got the call tonight, what would I do with you? Take you along without your IBHU? That’s where you fucked up, Pelletier. Not getting sucked into his game, but letting it push you to where you screwed yourself.”
Rev just stared at the squad leader. She was right, of course. He should have stopped when he reached his limit instead of trying to push it. Hell, he shouldn’t have let the bastard suck him into it in the first place.
“So, I need to ask you this, and you’d better be honest about it. You’re both in the same platoon. This little thing that happened, can you put that behind you? Can you function as a team?”
Rev had been wondering about that very same thing. But he had to admit, what had the karnan really done? He sucked Rev into making a fool of himself. So? Marines did the same thing to each other. In this case, the damage he suffered was his own fault, a consequence of his own ego. If he was honest with himself, he couldn’t blame the karnan.
He just didn’t want to be honest with himself. He wanted to lay the blame on the other guy. But that wouldn’t change the facts.
And when his squad leader put the question like that, there was only one answer. “I can work with him.”
“Good.”
“But if the opportunity comes up, I’ll get him back.”
“Fair enough . . . as long as he isn’t damaged. We can’t have anyone sent to sickbay, understand?”
“I understand.”
That seemed to end their meeting. It wasn’t as bad as he’d expected. But this was just his squad leader. T
here was still the platoon sergeant, the platoon commander, and on up the chain.
“Should I go report to Top Barber?”
“Why should you?”
“You know, to tell her what my status is.”
“You don’t need to tell her anything. That’s my job. No, you go back to berthing. Tomorrow, you get yourself combat-ready. Meet us at the sims when you’re done.”
The weight fell off his shoulder with a crash. Not having to go listen to the platoon sergeant give him a ration was a huge relief. He was still pissed at himself for being stupid, but at least he wasn’t going to have the entire chain of command tell him how stupid he was.
“OK. Thanks, Sergeant Gamay.”
He stood up to leave when she asked, “So, Sergeant Pelletier. What lesson have you learned?”
“Uh . . . don’t push past my capabilities?”
She shook her head.
He didn’t know what she was getting at. There were lots of lessons here, and he didn’t want to sit here and guess which one she meant.
“What should I have learned?” he asked to just get to the point.
“Don’t let your enemies define the conflict. If you let them do that, you’ll lose every time.”
Rev stood there for a moment as what she said sunk in. She was right, of course, and that, in a nutshell, might be the most valid piece of advice he’d received since he was conscripted.
And it took a Rigel Cluster legionnaire to tell him that.
15
It was never really as bad after being shown up by the karnan as Rev had feared. Sure, he had to endure ribbing—a lot of ribbing—but for the most part, it seemed good-natured. A significant number of people even gave him props for trying. And if Kvat and the other MDS troopers seemed to lord it over him, well, Rev could live with that.
And plan a revenge. He didn’t know what it would be yet, but he could take his time and make it good.
It wasn’t as if he had a lot of free time to work on something. Second Battalion was one of the first to get companies slated for a shipboard deployment, and the workups were non-stop.
There was pressure from some quarters not to deploy at all. They were the Home Guard, after all, there to protect Mother Earth and the home system. But with the war over, the Counsel General himself had his fingers in the pie. With most of humanity united, he didn’t want to see it splinter into the squabbling factions that had plagued humankind for centuries, not to mention outright war breaking out.
An Uneasy Alliance: Book 4 of the Sentenced to War Series Page 13